Connecting school leadership with teaching, learning and parenting in diverse cultural contexts: Western and Asian perspectives

This chapter addresses school leadership from two perspectives, both of which provide a context to the process. The first connects leadership with the core work of schools, namely, teaching and learning, and contextualizes schooling within its socio-cultural environment. The second draws international comparisons and contrasts between these networks in selected Western and Asian communities with the purpose of illustrating cross-cultural differences. Two important themes underpin the argument presented. The first is that leadership is best thought of — not as a separate or discrete set of processes — but in relation to the myriad activities that take place in school communities. Leadership, above all, is interactive and interdependent. The second is that much of the existing body of knowledge on school leadership is based on Anglo-American ideas and empiricism (Dimmock & Walker, 1998a, b). Consequently, relatively little is known about school leadership elsewhere in the world. This second theme centers on leadership being an essentially social and cultural process. Copyright © 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers.